There comes a time in every politician’s career when it’s time to dispatch the kids. For Mitt Romney, it would appear now is that time.

Yesterday, a national Bloomberg poll showed Obama leading Romney by 13 points, with Romney up 20 points on people who view him as “out of touch” with average Americans. Last night Mitt’s sons appeared on Conan O’Brien’s show—the hippest show with the youngest demographic among the major late-night shows—to paint their dad as a regular, fun-loving guy. Who knows if there was any causal relation here—Conan’s schedule is probably worked out well in advance. But the coincidence was striking.

Conan aired footage of Romney’s son Matt prank calling him with the Schwarzenegger soundboard during the primaries when Mitt was seeking the Governator’s endorsement. And he takes it in good stride. Someone in the Romney camp clearly realized that seeing Mitt as the butt of a prank, vulnerable in some way, might trigger some empathy and and make us view him momentarily as a human.

Good strategy, but he’ll probably need to be more proactive with this stuff after a year of weirdo “corporations are people” comments that led Jason Sudeikis to satirize him on “SNL” as an actual robot. Watch the prank below.